Rise in wearable technology to be driven by smartphone growth

The global wearable computing market is set to rapidly grow into a multi-billion dollar industry over the next year, according to research from professional search engine Reportlinker.com.

Wearable Computing: Technologies, Applications and Global Markets says that the market will grow at a compound annual growth rate of 43.4% from around US$5 billion forecast for 2013 to US$9.2 billion in 2014 and more than US$30.2 billion in 2018.

The report adds that the key market driver for wearable computing is the soaring global popularity of smartphones.

At the moment, the market is at a relatively nascent stage and with shipment of 20 million units in 2012 (US$800 million).

The report said: “Traditional markets for wearable devices have primarily been focused on non-consumer niche applications including those in healthcare, defence/security, enterprise and industrial markets. However, recent advances in materials sciences, electronics, photonics and software are enabling a potentially vast range of new lightweight, wearable computing products to emerge.